KARACHI – Mansoora Hassan was born in Peshawar, and received her Master of Fine Arts degree from the Pratt Institute of New York. She is a photographer and painter working in mixed media, and a video artist who uses these methods to address issues concerning humanity and to facilitate cross-cultural exchange. She keeps a working studio in Washington DC where she has lived for over two decades, and also maintains a studio each in Lahore and New York.
She has lived in Bolivia, spent five years in Egypt and resided for around three years in Turkey before moving to New York. She has travelled extensively, and her works are in public and private collections worldwide, including Pakistan, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Morocco, Tunisia, Malaysia, Bolivia, Uruguay, Senegal, UAE, UK and USA. In 2000, she co-founded Creativity 21st Century, a non-profit organisation based in the US, to promote national and international art projects. She is a founding member of Take Me to the River (TMTTR), which was created in 2002 to connect with cultures and communities around the world.
The TTMTR group has formed a network of individuals who contribute to dialogue about social, political and ecological welfare. Her work in the travelling TMTTR shows has been about overcoming differences using the symbols of the bridge and the river as a connecting force. She is the principal founding member of the Friends of the Cairo Opera Foundation, which aims to increase cross-cultural understanding, education and human development through the creative, expressive and performing arts. In 2003, she facilitated the Cairo audition of Daniel Barenboim and Edward Said’s West-Eastern Divan.
Her work addresses the upheavals and strife the East and West face in today’s world. She focuses on such themes as refugees, displacement and empowerment. Influenced by Sufi thought, she has travelled the world on a spiritual journey, looking for the common thread that binds us. Photos courtesy Mansoora Hassan
